diff --git a/src/main/java/uk/org/okapibarcode/backend/Symbol.java b/src/main/java/uk/org/okapibarcode/backend/Symbol.java
index 65622360..d99c0922 100644
--- a/src/main/java/uk/org/okapibarcode/backend/Symbol.java
+++ b/src/main/java/uk/org/okapibarcode/backend/Symbol.java
@@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ public abstract class Symbol {
     protected int symbol_width;
     protected int default_height;
     protected boolean readerInit;
-    public String encodeInfo = "";
+    protected String encodeInfo = "";
     
     public enum DataType {
         UTF8, LATIN1, BINARY, GS1, HIBC
@@ -74,6 +74,10 @@ public final void unsetReaderInit() {
     public int getWidth() {
         return symbol_width;
     }
+    
+    public String getEncodeInfo() {
+        return encodeInfo;
+    }
 
     // TODO: surely we'll need something better than this to account for the height
     // of the human readable aspect of different bar codes
diff --git a/src/main/java/uk/org/okapibarcode/gui/OkapiUI.java b/src/main/java/uk/org/okapibarcode/gui/OkapiUI.java
index 19db97c7..2449aae4 100644
--- a/src/main/java/uk/org/okapibarcode/gui/OkapiUI.java
+++ b/src/main/java/uk/org/okapibarcode/gui/OkapiUI.java
@@ -2006,7 +2006,7 @@ public void encodeData() {
         displayPanel.setBackground(paperColour);
         displayPanel.add(drawSymbol);
         topPanel.add(displayPanel);
-        encodeInfoArea.setText(symbol.encodeInfo);
+        encodeInfoArea.setText(symbol.getEncodeInfo());
         topPanel.updateUI();
         pack();
     }